Against the Loveless World

by Susan Abulhawa

The contradictions of our relationship cemented. I felt affection for this woman who had blackmailed and prostituted me. The force of sharing unspeakable secrets created a closeness with her, at the same time that I had an urge to get away from her and never see her again. More paradoxical was that Um Buraq loved me, at the same time she used and exploited me. I can’t explain that, but I know it’s true.

Everybody has a little bit of love for the same sex, some people more than others.”

No therapist or clergy can substitute for the confidence of a whore, because whores have no voice in the world, no avenue to daylight, and that makes us the most reliable custodians of secrets and truth.

There was something alluring about living on the margins, in secret disrepute. It freed me from the drudgery of respectability—the low-paying jobs, social pretenses, children. I could have some autonomy without a husband. I could be my family’s breadwinner, the powerful woman who took care of others. And all I had to do was what I loved most of all: dance.

Perhaps predators in particular deserve pity, if only for the spiritual sewage of them.

When powerless, following world events only highlights your impotence.

I wasn’t yet ready to give up on men. Part of me wanted to know if men could be good; if it was possible for physical intimacy with a man to be something honest, loving, nurturing, powerful, and passionate. I wondered, too, whether I was lovable. I needed to know, because I thought we might all die soon.

I spoke now from my secret shame, the smallness I’ve always felt and the grand bravado coating it all.

“The way you live your life in our culture, without apology or shame, even if with sadness, makes you extraordinary and special, Nahr. You, more than any of us, are a revolutionary, and the irony is that you don’t even see it,” he said. The real irony, I thought, was that it was only in that moment with him, when I was truly seen and valued, that I did not feel shame.

It’s romantic, but without a sexual impulse, at least not an overwhelming kind. It’s strangely familiar and comfortable, but not purely friendship either.”

No one had ever kissed me with such love, and it occurred to me that happiness can reach such depths that it becomes something akin to grief.

“Anyway, chaos theory is an entire field of mathematics. It is not about disorder. In fact, chaos is not random. It forms predictable patterns,” said Bilal the Stoned Professor. “In what appears to be random, there are actually very complex but deterministic systems, with repeating patterns, constant feedback, and organization that is very sensitive to the starting conditions.”

“It’s important to understand that deterministic doesn’t mean that it’s predictable. And unpredictable doesn’t mean random. The weather is an example of chaos theory. The stock market. They are deterministic, they have repeating patterns and constant feedback, and they’re self-organizing. Unpredictable, but not random. A butterfly flapping its wings in Japan could initiate a hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico. That’s part of chaos theory.” Bilal thought for a moment, and added, “You see, Nahr? You were right. Dancing is a good example of a chaotic system, and I believe you are also right that revolution could be as well.”

“For the ones we love, nothing is ever trouble, and everything is never enough.”

I wanted to make love, but my body did not. Or maybe it was the other way around, my body wanted it, but I didn’t.

“You can only be destroyed by believing that you really are what the white world calls a nigger.”

There were others in the world who, like us, were seen as worthless, not expected to aspire or excel, for whom mediocrity was predestined, and who should expect to be told where to go, what to do, whom to marry, and where to live. Mr. Baldwin tells Big James: “Here you were: to be loved. To be loved, baby, hard, at once, and forever, to strengthen you against the loveless world.”

“There is no reason for you to try to become like white people and there is no basis whatever for their impertinent assumption that they must accept you. The really terrible thing, old buddy, is that you must accept them. And I mean that very seriously. You must accept them and accept them with love. For these innocent people have no other hope. They are, in effect, still trapped in a history which they do not understand; and until they understand it, they cannot be released from it. They have had to believe for many years, and for innumerable reasons, that black men are inferior to white men. Many of them, indeed, know better, but, as you will discover, people find it very difficult to act on what they know. To act is to be committed, and to be committed is to be in danger.”

I am grateful not to be handled delicately.